There has been a significant increase in clerical child sex abuse allegations reported to Catholic Church authorities in Ireland over the past year.
A report published on Thursday morning showed that during the year April 2017 to April 2018, 135 notifications of allegations, suspicions and concerns were received by the Church’s child protection watchdog, its National Board for Safeguarding Children (NBSC), compared to an overall figure of 86 for the previous year.
A total of 104 of the 135 notifications related to allegations of child sexual abuse.
The 135 notifications allegedly involved 35 diocesan priests and 63 members of religious orders or congregations, or 98 individuals in total. That compares with 76 in the previous year, an increase of 29 per cent.
Of the 98 clergy concerned 45 are deceased, 21 are unknown (identity not given by the complainant), and 32 are alive.
NBSC chief executive Teresa Devlin pointed out however that "with one exception, most of the alleged abusive behaviour occurred before 2000, in line with previous reports and should not be taken to indicate that the church is currently becoming a less safe place for children."
She said “we believe that the upturn in reporting of abuse is linked to the media reporting of high profile abuse cases. Often simply seeing and hearing people talk about what they went through gives victims the strength and resolve to report what was done to them.
“And the fact that they come forward is to be lauded as it allows them to access the support they need and organisations like ours to better understand the mistakes made and how to rectify them.”
In general however she noted that “the falling trend reported on for the previous three years has been reversed for both the number of new allegations and the number of respondents.”
She said “however the fact that allegations continue to be reported and that there is an increase in the number of reports is an important sign that there are still complainants who require a pastoral response and that any complacency is misplaced.”
The dates on which the abuse reported to the NBSC in the year to April last is alleged to have taken place were not provided for 57 cases. Of the remaining 78 dates when the alleged abuse took place the report indicated that 14 were before 1960, 63 between 1960 and 1999, and one between 2000 and 2001.
The report concluded that the latest figures suggest that “the amount of abuse of children within the Catholic Church in Ireland in recent years is small. While this should not permit any complacency, there is reason for some optimism that the developments made in child safeguarding over the last 10 years in the Catholic Church in Ireland have been effective.”
